How to Paint Vinyl or Linoleum Flooring

…And there are times when you should just gleefully jump in with both feet to a project with no idea of the end results.

Deciding what to do about our laundry room floor was definitely the latter. I showed you guys the before and after photos of our $157 laundry room makeover last week:

And I mentioned that the vinyl floors in the “before” photo appeared unclean in person. I may have understated. (Eww.)(I probably should’ve cropped that photo a little, but I couldn’t bear to cut off the tiny baby foot in the bottom left corner. I’m just not the kind of person who likes to cut off baby feet, sue me.)

We had a goal to redo the flooring for about a dollar a square foot, and we laid out five ways to update vinyl sheet flooring on a budget. The craziest idea – but also the most oddly tempting – was to paint them. The paint experts we spoke to thought we might be mildly insane. One guy tried so hard to talk us out of painting our floors that we ended up agreeing we wouldn’t do it just so he could get some sleep that night.

But since we’re basically hard-core DIY rebels who run with all the wrong crowds and break the rules, we did it anyway.

*Flashes tattoo sleeve and spits.*
*Gets on motorcycle and rides away.*
*Does not even use turn signal.*

Materials Needed

Regular latex primer like you’d use on the wall.

Enough porch and floor paint to cover your floor. (We bought a gallon of teal and a gallon of white because you can’t buy it any smaller amounts, and we had LOTS left over in our 50 sq ft room.)

Painter’s tape (for stripes)

TriSodium Phosphate (This is a heavy duty cleaner you can find at Home Depot or order it right here. We paid about $7 at our home improvement store, so the current amazon price as of this posting is actually cheaper than that.)

Step One: Clean

Clear out the room and clean the floors with soap and water, then scrub them with trisodium phosphate.

Having the room cleared was probably the hardest part for us. We lived with the washing machine and dryer taking up our whole hallway for about a week.
It was super duper fun times squeezing through there, and also lugging our dirty cloth diapers to the laundromat.

Step Two: Sand

Using a fine-ish sandpaper (maybe 180 or 220-grit – we just used what we had), sand the floors to remove the shiny finish.
If you’re already like: “Power tools? Ya lost me.” – don’t freak out; this is easy. Just put some sandpaper on that guy – it velcros right to the front – turn it on, and rub it all over the floors until they’re not shiny. Sanders are the least-scary of all power tools.

If you have anything stuck to the floors – we had some paint spots from when we sloppily painted the walls – sand or scrape those off too.

Step Three: Repair

(You get to skip this step if your vinyl has no holes in it.)

If you have any tiny holes in your floor in discreet locations, you can try to patch the holes. This patch job is not perfect, but the hole we had in our floor was actually underneath where the washing machine sits, so we weren’t concerned with perfection.

Even after we patched hole, you would definitely notice an imperfection in the floor if it was in a more obvious location. Still, if your floors are vinyl and you can’t change them for budget reasons, painted holey floors look better than unpainted ones!

So here’s how we repaired it. First, we used a utility knife to cut around the hole where it was swollen and awkwardly protruding at us.
Then we filled the hole with all-purpose caulk and smoothed it out the best we could. Caulk works best because it expands and contracts like the floors do.
After the caulk dries, smooth it out so it’s even with the rest of the floors. Wipe away any excess with a damp cloth. And that’s it!

Step Three: Prime the floors

Already this is sounding easy, don’t you think? It’s really not so hard! We used standard latex wall primer that we had sitting in the garage.
Just roll on the primer and let it dry. We might’ve done two coats because we had no idea if it would work at all anyway, and we were being extra careful.

Step Four: Paint!

Before you do this, PLEASE make sure you bought “porch & floor” paint! That stuff is made to be rained on, walked on, and spit on by tattoo-wearing DIY rebels.

This step was actually about a hundred times more fun than painting a wall, because you just pour the paint right on the floor and roll it around.

Would you PLEASE stop checking out Andy’s legs? Have a little class, guys. Come on.

Step Five: Fancy ‘em up as you desire.

Obviously, we painted our floors with horizontal stripes which we taped off with painter’s tape.
But I think a stenciled floor would look SUPER cool. I actually considered doing that for mine, but decided that sweet peacock stencil I’d chosen was too directional. Something like this or this would be awesome. (And I’m giving away a stencil right now – go enter here!)

One thing to consider when you’re choosing your stencil design: if your vinyl floor has any kind of texture, that’ll still show up after it’s painted. You can see in the pictures above that our floors have a grid pattern that’s indented into the flooring. We chose our stripe size to be four little grid squares wide, so the stripes work with the grid texture. It might not be a big deal for you, just something to consider.

But how do these floors hold up against wear and tear?

I’m SO glad you asked. We’ve had our floors painted for about five months, and so far we have seen nary a scratch. They still look perfect. The porch and floor paint is made for, well porches. And also floors. So it can handle your pretty little feet.

That said, we don’t drive bulldozers through our laundry room, or hold all-night raves there or anything, but I can tell ya that I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how clean and perfect they’ve stayed all these months and I have no reason to think they won’t stay that way for a long, long time.

Step Six: Enjoy

What do you think? Would you ever paint your floor? Have you ever defied the experts and won?

P.S.: If you like this post, make sure you check out these brilliant DIY curtain hacks!This post contains affiliate links

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Comments

I just did this two weeks ago except I guess I took the lazy way out because I skipped a few steps. I didn’t sand or repair holes but my vinyl flooring was not glossy. I painted two coats of the porch & floor paint w/out primer. So far, it’s holding up.

Please update me as to how the kitchen floor is holding up! I want to try my hand at this but am a bit worried about such a high traffic area? ie: kitchen
Also did anyone use anything on top of the final coat of floor paint?
Thank you

love it, love it, love it! And I’m impressed that you managed to squeeze around the washer and dryer in the hallway. When I first saw them, I was picturing you all having to climb over them every time!

It actually makes sense to me that paint would stick to vinyl better than it would to wood. I’ve painted wood floors in the past and the paint chips and peels almost right away. This looks fantastic, cost very little and is holding up well. I’ll call that a gigantic success story. Good job you 2!

See, it worked out that you didn’t post about this room for 5 months so that you could have some ammo behind the potential durability concern! You tattoo-sporting people are brave for trying this. It looks great!

Such a great decision…it’s inexpensive and looks fab! We painted our porch floor becuase it was in a major hurt before. So far, it’s held up okay, but time will tell. {And yes, we used porch and floor paint. ;)}

Haha!! I was totally checking out Andy’s legs, then scrolled down and saw your caption. Busted! I’m thinking about painting a design over my bedroom parquet floor, so this is encouraging. I listen to the experts, then do my own thing anyway. I’ve never primed/sealed a textured ceiling (I know… ugh) first… just jumped in and painted.

We have these same type of floors everywhere in this house! They’re coming up eventually but I’ve been wondering about maybe doing a little quick fix with some paint just like this. Your post was so fun, I just may have to do it!

Wow! Would you recommend putting a clear coat of something over the top for some gloss/extra protection, or do you think that would compromise the porch paint? I can’t get over how great your laundry room looks, btw!

We’ve actually heard that you should add polyurethane on top, but we thought it might compromise the porch paint. We weren’t sure, and we really needed to use our washing machine again, so we skipped it. It might add a nice gloss, but I don’t know how well it would hold up to traffic.

Polyurethane WOULD compromise the white parts of the porch paint as it yellows over time. However polyCRYLIC (different from polyurethane) is extremely durable, would extend the life of the porch paint almost certainly and would not compromise the color / finish in anyway. It would leave a bit of a glossier finish though, so if your porch paint is matte finish and you like it that way, then probably best to leave out the polycrylic. Anyway, I just thought this might be useful to know in case the floor started showing wear-and-tear anytime soon!

You should travel around the world making it your personal mission to cover all the ugly laminate! Love how it turned out – your whole laundry is amazing – bet they can’t tear you away from the washer now!
Kelly

What a great idea! I would have never thought of that. Pinned it to my board “Laundry Room” because that room is in my “site” for a major overhaul. I love the walls and cabinets also. I have my cat box in the laundry room and any rug I put in there would just be scattered with litter but I’m wondering now if I just paint a rug on using your technique??? Thanks for the inspiration!

Just kidding. I need to make Andy take pictures of me doing things, except that would mean pictures of me in all my best painting clothes… maybe that’s why it looks like Andy does everything. Or maybe it’s just that he does.

What would I use when I need to clean/wash my kitchen floor after I’ve painted them? Please…
Thank you for your brilliant hard work too. It’s going to save me from having to stare at my kitchen floor. Looks similar to your before photo. I cannot wait to DMS (do it myself)

I would TOTALLY give this a shot! They look 5000% better (even SHARP!) and I love that it’s so affordable. Home run, Kelly! Don’t know how you lived w/o washer dryer for a week???? I’d have been committed.
xo Heidi

Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!
I’ve been thinking about painting the vinyl floor in our powder room for 7 years but everyone (my husband & my father) told me I would ruin the floor. The floor is so ugly anything would be an improvement.
I can’t wait to try this

Anybody that is going to do this, make sure you wear a mask or a ventilator.
Some of that old linoleum flooring contains asbestos, if you are going to sand
it and kick up an asbestos dust storm, it would not be good.
If you can just paint it without sanding it, that would be safer.

Love love love love love! I told my husband that you did this, and he said, “that’s crazy talk.” I said that everyone said that, but you did it anyway, and it has held up really well. He’s down with the idea now! I’m not really sure if we have anywhere to do it, though. Hmmm….

How do you clean them without damaging the paint? Love this idea, but I would like to do it in a bathroom and I have to wonder if the moisture would cause the paint to peel or bubble and, of course, the floor would need cleaned regularly.

We just clean them with mild soap and water. Some people have said they sealed the floors with some kind of floor sealant, and that might not be a bad idea. We didn’t try it because we really needed to use our washing machine!

I’m so glad you linked this post to Kelly’s linky party. I have a vinyl floor in my bath that I need to update. (When time/money/energy allows). I love how your painted floor turned out. I also like the prior post showing other solutions. I am definitely inspired.

Wow! I mean… wow! I am so pinning this. Everything looks better with a fresh coat of paint. Even that ugly vinyl flooring. We want to buy a house soon. So if we end up getting vinyl flooring we can’t replace right away, I’ll know what to do!

Just a note — priming is good if you have color to cover. The BEST primer ever is Glidden’s Gripper. NO SANDING primer! It is amazing! And I would say yes, add poly to the top. If you have little ones and little bit starts to peel up, I could see said little one pulling on it and yanking up an entire stripe.

Good tutorial! We did this 2 years ago on top of old vinyl in a basement bathroom. We didn’t to the TSP and sanding, just primer and porch and floor paint. You do see the vinyl “pattern” through the final paint layer, but it doesn’t look weird. I also found that I needed several layers of the porch and floor paint to get a good result. Finally, it was very important to give the paint time to harden — not just dry. It took up to a week for ours because it didn’t have great ventilation.

Well, it’s super cute, that’s for sure! The only thing I would have considered doing differently is the primer… I’d use either BIN (not the latex based variety, but the ammonia based one, that stuff really sticks… or there’s a newer primer out there that is latex based but supposed to be every bit as good, I’m not sure how to spell it, but it’s pronounced Sticks… it may be spelled Styx??) Anyway, thanks for the great tute, and cute room!!! Little Bit

Your laundry room looks amazing! I never would have thought to paint the floor! Love it!! I have a new Pinterest Power party and would love to have you share this and any other projects or recipes you have!

Thank you so much for sharing!!! I’m in the stages of buying my first house and as a newly single mom on a strict budget I was wondering if there was anything I could do to make the kitchen floors look better without breaking the bank, I’ll definetly be giving this a try!

I work for Sherwin Williams and we sell Porch and Floor enamel in quarts (in any color). It’s obviously too late for you but maybe other readers will find this helpful. Also, I would recommend adhesion primer. It’s made especially for surfaces that paint might have trouble adhering to. Great work!!

As I have done most of my own interior painting for years now, hope you don’t mind me suggesting that if one uses a good ‘Primer’ there is no need to sand the flooring surface. A favourite product of mine is Zinssers Bullseye 1-2-3 (water-based) Primer. In comparison to other Primers though a bit pricey, it is perfect to use on slick or glossy surfaces! I have used it to great success on laminate, ceramic tile, metal and over oil-based paint for both interior and exterior projects. Though its primary use is to cover up water-marks and stains just follow the application instructions on the can and ensure that the paint is cured (not dry) prior to the top coat of porch paint. -Brenda-
Footnote: I am NOT affiliated with Zinssers in any way.

a couple of questions…(this looks awesome!)
do you have any 4 legged kids walking on it???
what are you mopping with? have you used any of the cleaners with wax?? mop n glo type?
one other thing.. is the blue stripe also in the porch paint???

We have one pup but she doesn’t ever venture in there so I can’t attest to the scratchability. We’ve just used water and mild soap to clean so far and it’s worked well. Since it’s just a laundry room and not a kitchen or bathroom or something, we haven’t had any crazy messes we’ve had to scrub or anything. And yes, the blue is also porch paint. Good luck!

How did you get the W/D back in w/out sliding them on the newly painted floor? Just a question because that is what I would have to do to get my W/D back in. These are terrific, I would love to do this in my kitchen, but don’t think I could live w/out a kitchen for very long. I wonder if I did it in stages????
Just curious what your thoughts are.

Holy mother of Batman! This is blowing my mind right now! Found you from the YHL forum and all I can say is WOW! Our laundry room looks a lot like your before picture. I think you have inspired me to get moving on getting a new look in there!

IVE THOUGHT ABOUT DOING THIS IN MY KITCHEN CUZ MY HUBBY SPLIT A GLUE THAT LOOKS PURPLE WHEN WE FIRST BOUGHT OUR HOUSE 6 YRS. AGO IVE TRYED COVERING WITH RUGS AND ITS NOT WORKING LOL.
MY QUESTION IS IF I DO PAINT MY LAMINATE FLOORING HOW DO I CLEAN IT? AS IN CAN I MOP OR WHAT??? LOL
THANKS,
ONEBRAVEMOMOF2

A lot of hardware store people are very helpful and knowledgeable but don’t seem to have enough imagination. Or maybe knowing how it “should be done” limits your imagination? I bought a 1940s house in 1982. The entire (quite large) kitchen was covered in 1970’s dark brown wood paneling. Every paint store and hardware store guy I talked to gave me elaborate explanations about how it was impossible to paint this, I should sheet rock etc. But my budget was practically non existent. I talked to an interior decorator that I worked for in high school and she was all “they’re silly! get some No-Sand, primer and paint”. That kitchen looked great. Anytime I told one of those people what I had done, (cause I had so many projects, I was always in these stores) they would shake their heads and look very worried. I learned a lot redoing that house, me and the Reader’s Digest how to do stuff books and carefully ignoring some good advice.

I actually used the white porch/floor paint to paint over an old desk and dresser for my daughter’s play/craft room. Experts told me it wouldn’t work, but I figured if its made to hold up on floors, why not hold up to a 10 year old crafter?? It has worked fabulously!!! I’m thinking to do my garage floor in this next (laundry is in garage).

That ‘new’ floor just makes you smile! I love it! I am custodian of my church. The mens room needs an update so badly but we have low funds. The floor is old vinyl tile put down in the 50’s. I believe this is what I will do with that ugly floor and it shall be wonderful then!

Just wondering how the floors have held up 6 months later – I really want to do this in my laundry room! My only concern is its more like a high traffic mud room that leads to the garage. I’d put a few runners down afterwards, but just a thought I’d ask if the floor was as tough as you initially thought.

Hi! What a fantastic idea. Your laundry room looks beautiful! I would love to do this in my laundry room but I have one concern. My lin-ugly-um has a diamond shape in the middle of every 12×12 square along with a line that goes from each point of the diamond to the edge of the square.(hopefully that makes sense) Basically it’s hideous. Stripes would probably be out of the question but do you have any other suggestions besides just painting the whole floor one color?
Thanks so much!
Patrice

Hey, I loved this! Now this is my idea of a cool and informative blog. I love doing stuff on a budget too. I will have to look through your posts to see if you have any tips on re-painting your kitchen cabinets and doing a back splash. Please check my blog out at http://www.boulderhomesource.com/blog/. It is mostly about real estate and the Boulder Lifestyle but I have featured a few home improvement articles about my personal home buying and selling experience which involved staging, repairing, and cleaning my house on a budget! Do you like to cook on a budget too?

I’m getting ready to do a complete kitchen redo, diy of course. Painted cabinets, walls, counter tops, new sink, faucet and back splash. My plan was to ensure this awful vinyl until the entire house is finished , when we are going to purchase new flooring wall to wall. Not any more. I’m painting that bad boy. Thanks for the courage!

Love your floors! I am getting ready to try this in my bathroom budget makeover. Just wondering: did you use the satin finish latex porch & floor paint or the gloss finish oil based porch & floor paint? I wanted to go with a latex but it only comes in satin finish and I wasn’t sure about cleanability [yep, that’s a word (:] in a bathroom setting. Also, we have those peel and stick vinyl floor tiles that are supposed to imitate hardwood floors so they are like strips butted up against each other instead of one continuous sheet. Do you think this will work ok as far as painting over the cracks? Thanks so much for posting such a great tutorial… this is just what I need until I can save up enough for some fab tile flooring!

We used the latex porch and floor paint. I think the glossier it is, the easier to clean it is…? That was my thinking. I’m not sure who the paint will do on the peel-and-stick strips. Maybe you can test a little spot behind the toilet or something and see how it does… Good luck!

I have a friend who did it in her bathroom and said it’s holding up well. I’m not sure because I haven’t tried it yet, but if it’s paint the floors or buy new ones, you could always try it and just replace them if it doesn’t hold up.

Thanks Kelly – good news on the bathroom floor. My wooden floor is a much larger areas and I don’t have anywhere I can test it in a small section. I don’t really want to pay for the paint and waste time just to get a new floor although I think it might be the only way unless anyone else can offer any suggestions.

Wow! that looks fantastic. The entire downstairs of my house has the most disgusting tile (i think it’s really plastic or something) that NEVER LOOKS CLEAN no matter what I do. I would love to re-tile but am a broke girl renting a house. My question is, is it insane to do this in a rented house, ie, would it be possible to remove the paint if the next renters don’t want the paint on the floor? Has anyone done this?

Hi
I painted my kitchen floor 4 years ago . Did the TSP and Sanding thing then I used Industrial Plastic Undercoat , Latex paint , and 3 coats of Water-based Floor Varnish . It has held up really well.

OMG you just totally saved my sanity! Moving into an apt with hideous vinyl flooring in the kitchen. Thought of laying new tile but thats costly and a lot of work for a place you don’t own. This will totally save the day!! Thanks for sharing!

I love the way you write! Made me grin… A friend of mine just asked me today to possibly paint her deck next year to make it look like a carpet and I suggested to get vinyl flooring instead to paint on that so she can store it inside in the harsh winter here in New England and I offered to check out if that is possible. I’ve seen it done for indoors but not outdoors. So this was very helpful to me and I will try on a smaller scale first before I tackle a large size ‘carpet’. Thank you so much!

WOW. Ridiculously excited that I just stumbled across this. We have some freakin’ HIDIOUS linoleum in our bathroom… And kitchen… And laundry room… And I’m an inexperienced DIYer who would be terrified to rip up flooring but PAINTING I think I can handle! Never in a million years would have thought to paint the bathroom floor!! Think I’ll try it out in the bathroom first!!

Ok, Mind= Blown! I don’t think I EVER would have thought of this, but I am IN LOVE with the idea. My husband and I are VERY suddenly being faced with moving into his grandmother’s house which has been rented out for a year and DEMOLISHED by said renters. We are moving in to revamp the house in exchange for free rent, but it is a DAUNTING task! We were trying to figure out what we were going to do with 2 rooms covered in the nastiest, ugliest lino floors (on a super, amazingly limited budget) you can possible imagine- I’m talking 1000xs worse than your above “before” pic, lol. Now I know what I can do!!!!!! Thank you so much- Newest, biggest fan! LOL

It looks great and we have that same awful linoleum ~ used to be in both upstairs bathrooms and the kitchen area, but only the kitchen/half bath/laundry room are left! Not sure I would want to paint it, but just put groutable vinyl tile in the kids bathroom (my test space) and it is gorgeous so the kitchen area is up next. Only problem is the space is very large and we will need to move the fridge and washer/dryer out so the plan is daunting!

I did paint the tile around my fireplace though and it is gorgeous! I found a tile that I loved and then duplicated the look with a faux finish!

I’d love to do this to my bathroom floor. No matter how often I clean it, it still looks dirty! Two questions;
1. Can this be done on vinyl tiles?? (that’s what in my bathroom)
2. Does the primer have to be latex?? I am very allergic so can’t have latex anywhere in the house.

I’m not sure about either one of those things. Both the primer and paint were latex. If you can’t use latex paint in your house at all, I’m not sure what you’d use instead? Oil-based? I don’t really know how you paint with a latex allergy so I can’t speak to that.

i am very seriously considering painting (probably stenciling, but maybe stripes…aaagghhh decisions decisions!) my kitchen floor and its still sort-of-new (is like 7 years old considered sort-of-new?) but still pretty uggggly linoleum floor… i’m all about painting anything i can get my little hands on… just gotta figure out how to move the fridge out of the way… thanks for the awesome tutorial and thanks to Ashley from Domestic Imperfection for suggesting i check out your post on this!!

I found your site after doing a google search for painting linoleum floors Wow am I glad I did! We have a 130 year old house and probably 40-50 year old vinyl/linoleum floors which our floor guy absolutely ruined when we moved here 4 years ago – by stripping off all the design and color. (They were ugly but in good shape before). We threw around the idea of painting them to avoid another year of embarrassment when having company Now we can use your tips and I know it will work…*huge sigh of relief*

We JUST finished doing this and I LOVE it- Our laundry room doubles as a pass-thru to our garage so I am curios to see how it holds up. We used Beauti-tone acrylock primer ( it sticks to ANYTHING, even a mirror!) and we also did white and navy stripes. This Blog was the best DIY guide! THANK you!!! Blessings!

First of all, I’d give anything to have a laundry room that size with a window in it.. This was a great tuitorial, great job on it. Now tell me something, why didn’t your husband use a pole extenstion on his roller instead of “breaking his back” You covered all the details and they were easy to follow. I have thought of doing the same thing in our bathrooms. Seems like when we had our toilet in main bathroom replaced, the plumber informed us there were 3 layers of flooring. We purchased this house in 2005 and it appears that the seller went to a home improvement store and got a cheap piece of linoleum and had the painters to glue it down, adding shoe molding on top and never painting the shoe molding, didn’t remove all the wallpaper, just painted over it. What a mess. Hired “cheap flight by night” painters obviously for a cheap price. The seller is into real estate so he knew who he could call and they could turn the job around quickly and work cheap. I don’t want to have to pay a plumber to pull up the new toilet, while a handyman attempts to find out what’s under the linoleum or vinyl sheeting, then having to pay the plumber to reinstall the toilet again.
Maybe I’ll try the same thing you did. Paint the floor! Thanks for sharing this tuitorial and pictures with us.

Awesome, awesome, awesome. You’ve inspired me to do this in our gnarly downstairs bath/laundry room. I just can’t stomach paying money to redo the ugly officey grey linoleum floors. It feels like the equivalent of setting dollar bills on fire. This is an excellent solution! Thanks!

I love the porch/floor paint! I painted my daughter’s furniture with it for her craft/play room and its held up for over a year now!! She was just excited because I let her pick out her new knobs at Hobby Lobby and now her furniture all matched!

redoing old farm house and bathroom has textured vinyl on to walls by sink about height of wainscoating. It also is several shades of green with cream. Can I paint it then rag texture for contrasting colors? husband won’t let me replace cus stuck really well and i excellent shape. Help!

This was a great lesson. LOT of people asking if they can lay our cheap peel & stick vinyl flooring over old vinyl flooring. Our tile WILL stick but I will now recommend the sanding technique because I’m sure the adhesion will be better without the glossy finish.

Epic pinterest fail — Dunno what we did wrong, but the porch/floor paint did not stick to the primer. After letting the white color dry for 24 hours, we taped it and did turquoise stripes, only to have the white paint peel off in sheets when taking off the tape. Huge mess… now we will tear up the linoleum and hope that the cement underneath is paintable…

Wow, really?! I’ve heard from lots of people who did this and it worked. This is the first I’ve heard of it failing. So sorry to hear that! It sounds like maybe the floor wasn’t sanded or prepped quite enough. Either way, I’m sorry it didn’t work for you! Ours is still holding strong.

I was gonna ask how they are now and I’m also wondering about doing this in my kitchen. I’m currently painting in my kitchen walks and cabinets (as in partly done just stopped for a break) and I spray painted the inside of the cabinet where my drawers go with a can of red spray paint.i I’d never seen spray paint do this but I now have a splotchy “sunburn”on my legs and get from the spray that blew around. Also four or five feet back where the drop cloth wasn’t covering the floor, our greenish linoleum had a later of redishnes :p so maybe il have to paint over that? If it doesn’t last…we want to remodel in a few years. can of red spray paintof red sprayt. Id never seen spray paint do this but I now have asplotchy

I love these. I happen to be renting in a place with what everyone else considers “beautiful hardwood floors,” but they are laid out in a square pattern I really don’t like. If they were mine I would paint them!

Oh my god, I absolutely love the floor!!! I started my day out on the computer searching for something and came upon this……it was like it was “meant to be”. I rent a house and the floors are absolutely disgusting but my landlord is not in the “mood” to be replacing them….when I moved in I spent two days on my hands and knees washing the 3×3 squares and try and get all the dirt and grime that has built up over many previous tenants…..I wore my fingers to the bone…but I had clean floors…though all the work , to me…they didn’t really ever look clean.This might be my answer, as it appears to be more economical choice….I am so excited to try it…..

We recently paint our oak woodwork white using a primer made to help the paint stick to the shiny surface. I bet you could do this with the floors and skip the sanding stage. If it turns out I will let you know;-)

This was a trainwreck in our house. So disappointed, but so glad we did the small laundry room before we did the whole kitchen (although I have a $70 stencil already I can’t return..darn it!). We thoroughly cleaned the floor 3x with TSP, sanded it, oil primed it twice and painted it twice. We also put a layer of polycrylic on it. We wanted to put 3 layers of polycrylic down because we had an old vintage laundry ad painted in the center that isn’t as simple to fix, but lightly sanding the first layer takes the paint right up. In fact, everything does. If you rub on it, the paint comes up. It’s only been done for a week now and it’s already coming off all over. I think with the bazillion different types of linoleum and vinyl it just doesn’t work on all. Ours was the unfortunate one that didnt Took is a TON of time and I don’t expect it to last more than 6 mo-year Do you think the oil primer could have done it? I thought that would be even more durable. That’s what we’ve put on paneling in the house and on the paintable wallpaper with no issue.

Oh no! Yes, if you used oil-based primer and latex paint, I think that’ll be a problem just about every single time. I don’t think there’s any situation where you can safely mix oil-based primer and latex-based paint and get a good result. I bet that’s what happened. So bummed for you!

Really? We had to paint our walls this way. We had paneling, so we were told to use oil based primer first followed by latex paint. We were told/did the same with the vinyl wallpaper that’s on the walls (previous owner put it up to hide imperfections of 135 year old plaster). We painted oil primer, then latex there too. I hope that doesn’t fall apart! Eek! But I suppose I won’t be walking on the walls either I think I’ll be daring and do the kitchen floor, but with latex and hope for the best! Thanks!

Doing some more research on this…everything I read says oil PRIMER is just fine with latex paint and its preferable on things like wallpaper, paneling, moisture areas, etc. But you should never try to paint latex paint over oil PAINT. Maybe it’s just something with the porch and patio paint. Goodness…good thing it’s a tiny room!

We used a primer on a wall that was supposed to be used over oil based paint followed by latex and it was a disaster. The entire wall bubbled and paint was constantly falling off. I would avoid using oil base. Semi or high gloss latex paint is less porous than low luster or flat paint and holds up nicely. I would rather use latex and repaint a earlier than use oil.

For future reference, there needs to be longer dry times between coats. Sounds like you primer dried but did not cure. For oil paint, I would suggest 4 days between costs, latex 2 days. For the five layers you applied it should have been 2 weeks at least depending on the weather.

This really does look great and seems fairly easy and inexpensive. We just bought a new house and the bathroom floors are vinyl now but we won’t be able to replace them for awhile. Would painting them work in a bathroom? How do you clean the painted vinyl floor? Would you just sweep it or could you mop it, maybe just a little warm soapy water or just water?

wow! what a brilliant idea you had in there! I was having a hard time cleaning and maintaining my floors when its design is slowly vanishing. Thanks for the tips! your floor looks absolutely new and adorable! I’ll definitely do this one! I love to design my floor!

I use a steam cleaner (H20 X-5 steam mop) how do painted floors hold up with regular steam cleaning?
Thinking of doing our kitchen dining area which is quite large and absolutely hideous vinyl-not forever but okay maybe forever until we can afford real wood floors.

Yes!! I too bought an old house on the cheap(ish) and am redoing it all myself. But, I had no idea I could revamp my grimy bathroom floor! Now my only problem is choosing a color. I love the idea of a stripe, but I have the following colors: stormy/civil war blue + warm chocolate accent wall + tangerine towels. I love the combination. But what on earth could I choose as a floor color? Hayelp!

Your floor looks amazing! I love the colors and the pattern. We are about to update bathrooms at our house. We had some tile left over from a previous tile job and should have enough to update one bath, but will have to buy tile for the other bath. They are small rooms. Just an FYI for those who would rather do tile my calculations are that for basically what you may have spent on paint/supplies we can do porcelain tile. We found some at home improvement store locally for 66 cents sq ft, so I’m about to become the master tiler in our house again. Then again I may put my 18 year old to work doing the tile. He needs the experience
Congrats on a great looking floor!!

This is the most creative home diy ever!!! I was a renter for many years in north jersey where 9 out of 10 rentals are extremely old homes and have cheap ugly flooring, i thought about painting many a laminate flooring and figured it was a crazy idea that would never work. I wish i would have tried this. You are genius! Lol

I read this post a few week ago and went right out and got some porch paint – on the oops table of all places – Anyway, i painted the floor and i love love love it, but it feels a little sticky. The paint is completely dry (i stayed off of it for a little over 73hrs after painting), but when i walk on it it’s kind of tacky. Has anyone else had this problem? How can i fix it?

You know, I haven’t tried polyurethane on top so I don’t know how well it would hold up, but it might help solve the tackiness problem. I actually thought our vinyl floors were more tacky before the paint, so maybe it’s a difference in paint type? Anyway, the poly might be worth trying in a small spot before you do anything big.

LOVE this post. You’re hilarious too – I’ve laughed out loud several times now at work from reading your posts! I have an AWFUL 70’s pattern vinyl bathroom floor and since we’re definitely on a budget with a little one as well, I was in despair until I found your post! Now I’m having luxurious bathroom…dreams. Now my challenge is to figure out what to do with our varied brown tiled-to-look-like-stone shower area… EEK!

Questions: How well should the primer work for our highly colorful flooring? Do you think there would be issues with doing this in a bathroom??

Hi, I was doing some internet searching and came across this post. I too painted our old 70’s vinyl floors in our former home. Both the bathroom & kitchen. They held up remarkably well. We cleaned, primed and painted them. Originally I used polyurethane over the floor paint but it yellowed. So I merely repainted with regular old wall paint. Loved it much better. I did repaint about every 3 years in the kitchen because I wanted a fresh new look. It’s still super easy.

With today’s primers and paints, painting an old vinyl floor is super easy and affordable.

I really hate to be a killjoy but I feel I should pass this on. If you decide to paint an old vinyl or linoleum floor – DO NOT SAND THE VINYL OR LINOLEUM!! Old vinyl and linoleum contain asbestos and sanding it will release the asbestos into the air.

I have two bathrooms that are painted battleship gray and have gray patterned linoleum. No, I didn’t do it — the house came that way. I already have the paint and wallpaper to fix the walls, but I wasn’t sure what to do with the floors. I was just hoping they’d look better when the walls were done. Now I have an alternate plan. If the floors are still ugly when I finish the walls, I will go with paint. Problem solved.

I’m wondering how long it had to dry after painting? We oy have the one (horrid vinyl-floored) bathroom and if we had to let it dry for more than 12 hours or so we’ll have to do it right before we go
away for a weekend or something.

Hi I wanted to ask you how long it took your laundry floor to dry once painted? I want to fix up our kitchen floor to get my house ready to sell and I’m waffling between painting and the stick-on tiles. My kitchen couldn’t be out of commission for more than I think 24 hours (12 would be better) so I wanted to see how close it’s be to that. Thanks!!!

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Hi, I'm Kelly. Glad you're here! This little blog is where I chronicle our efforts to fix up our beaten-down home on a tiny budget. We're not there yet, but here's a peek at the view along the way... (more)